Half an ounce of cinnamon.
Half an ounce of allspice.
Pulverize the spice, and boil all for fifteen or twenty minutes. When cold, add a pint of brandy.
Remarks on the Combinations of Cooking.
The preceding receipts have been tested by the best housekeepers. In reviewing them, it will be seen that there are several ways of combining the various articles, all of which have, in the hands of good housekeepers, proved successful. Still it will be found that some methods are more successful than others.
In most cases, the receipts have been written as given by the ladies, who endorse them as the best. But it is believed that the following general rules will enable a housekeeper to modify some of them to advantage.
In using the whites of eggs, it is found, as shown by several receipts, that various combinations are much lighter when they are cut to a froth, and put in the last thing. This is so in batter puddings, and several other receipts. It seems, therefore, probable that in all cases, cake and pies, and puddings that will allow it, will be lighter by adding the cut whites of the eggs the last minute before cooking. Sponge cake especially would most probably be most easily made light by this method.
In using alkalies with acids to raise mixtures, the poorest is pearlash, the next best is saleratus; bicarbonate of soda is still better, and sal volatile is best of all.
But one thing must be remembered in reference to sal volatile, and that is, that the lightness made by it is owing to the disengagement of the gas by heat. It is mixed with the flour, and when set in the oven, the heat volatilizes and expels the gas, and thus the lightness is induced. Of course hot water must not be used to dissolve it, as it would expel much of the gas. Sal volatile must be kept powdered, and closely confined in glass bottles with ground glass stoppers. It is certain to make any mixture light that can be raised by anything.
Cream tartar is best bought in lumps, and then pulverized and kept corked.